To Speak and To Be Silent
by Ravenclaw42
Summary: Helen Corana Levine is a rejected woman with no shred of hope left to her life. But she's given a new world, a second chance -- the chance to be a pawn in a game of gods and monsters, flung into the arms of a man who never suspected his own destiny.
1. Wednesday

Summary: Meet Helen Corana Levine -- abused, abandoned, lost and confused. A woman with nothing left to lose.... and the only glimmer at the end of the tunnel is that of an oncoming train. Is it possible to be given a second chance... even if you're destined to suffer just as much in your new life? Remus/OC romance/drama/angst/various other categories...  
  
A/N: Finally, proof that I'm not lying when I say I have a lot of stories going on. This fic has a faster pace than my HP/LotR crossover, Let Others Follow. This one has a skeleton outline, too -- fully formed and waiting to be written. It should probably go more smoothly than the other stories.  
  
The origin of the title will become apparent in the last or second-to-last chapter. I won't tell anything now. Every chapter will have a song or poem somewhere in it -- maybe more than one -- and they probably won't be classical either, just so you know; every one of them has come out of my music collection, which consists mainly of movie scores and pop music. Big favorites of mine are Vertical Horizon, Goo Goo Dolls, R.E.M. and U2. There's a LOT of U2 in this story.  
  
And that's it for the notes.... Read and Enjoy! (And Review too, I hope! *puppy eyes* Pretty Please? Just one little review?)  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Remus, Poppy Pomfrey, Voldemort, the Ministry of Magic -- oh crud, I just don't own any HP stuff. Drat the luck. It all belongs to JK Rowling and Warner Bros. and a whole bunch of publishers I don't know. I do own Helen, though, and you can't have her!  
  
Rating: PG-13 for violence. There're sexual implications in later chapters -- nothing on-page -- and there'll probably be some language at some point, but usually my characters aren't the cussing types.  
  
Spoilers: SS/PS and CoS of course, but mainly PoA and GoF  
  
No archiving without my consent, and feedback is ENORMOUSLY appreciated.  
  
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To Speak and To Be Silent  
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Chapter One: Wednesday  
  
_Yesterday the odds were stacked in favor of my expectations  
Flying above the rest  
Never falling from the nest  
  
Tuesday came and went and now I'm in a little situation  
Maybe it's for the best  
I can live alone I guess  
  
Maybe I can stand alone  
Maybe I'm strong as stone  
Even though the bird has flown  
Maybe he'll fly on home_  
-- Maybe' by Alison Krauss and Union Station  
  
Christmas Day dawned, reluctantly.  
  
Muted Scottish sunlight filtered through the ragged scraps of gray cloud that hung despondently in the sky, halfheartedly dodging obstacles such as trees and birds, until it came to a window; it seeped through the glass stained with dust and mud, providing a faint, washed-out gray light.  
  
This particular window was set in the wall of room #12 of the Black Magick Inn, in McLeod, Scotland. The minuscule town was named after a local clan; with its quaint town square and small houses built in old-style Scottish tradition, it was the ideal place for a Christmas vacation.  
  
The dirty window blotched the light, but it struggled through anyway. Its pale rays fell on an immaculately made bed, on a dresser with two nondescript photos on the top, on a small table with a single, stiff-backed chair facing it -- empty.  
  
The room was, in essence, empty, and yet a woman stood in front of the mirror over the dresser; and hers was the only movement in the room. Slowly, with long, precise strokes, the woman was brushing her hair.  
  
She must have been doing it for a long time. The blank light gleamed dully off of the fine brown tresses, glinting with that morning's routine shampoo-and-conditioning. The dampness from the shower had dried out almost an hour ago, and her hair was as clean and beautiful as it would ever be. Eventually the woman realized the futility of her brushing, and she lowered the comb, staring steadily at herself in the tarnished mirror.  
  
The room was not the distinctive, sterile sort of a chain motel, and it was certainly not _new_ -- the inn had probably been here for a century or longer -- but it was as clean as such an old room was likely to be. Still, the woman swept imaginary dust off of the dresser with one hand as she picked up her tiny, yin-yang earrings and put them on.  
  
She held her expression calm and steady, but she could not stop a tear from rolling over the tender, swollen bruise around her eye and down her pale cheek; nor could she control the small tic at the corner of her mouth that was the only outward sign of how much she wanted to just put her head down and sob her heart out.  
  
No. She had done that too many times in her life.  
  
Allan. Oh, Allan... he had been a four-month-long disaster, but he was the only thing she'd had to live for. And now even he was gone. Her parents, her sister, her first husband... they had all betrayed her. She should have known she was due for another spurning.  
  
Helen's parents were devout, and somewhat overzealous, Catholics. Helen didn't have any grudge against them for that; it was just that _she_ had never wanted to be a Catholic. She had some personal problems with their teachings that all magic was evil and Satanic; Helen liked the idea of paganism, and she understood very well that there was a difference between black magic and white. Helen had never acted outright against her parents' beliefs -- she had simply joined a Wicca group once to see what it would be like.  
  
Her parents had disowned her for it.  
  
Margaret, Helen's older sister, had also grown apart from their parents, but in a very different way. She rebelled by drinking, taking drugs, doing all the things those emotional anti-abuse commercials tell you not to do. Margaret had died of liver failure at the age of 31.  
  
Helen's first boyfriend, Michael, hand dumped her unceremoniously when she was fifteen, but only after stealing something that Helen could never replace -- her virginity. When Helen was nineteen, she had gotten married -- rashly -- to a man seventeen years older than her, named Lewis. Three years of unhappy marriage had led to an abortion, followed by a big, ugly lawsuit that ended in nothing but pain and divorce.  
  
They all seemed nice enough at first, men. All you saw in them was what you wanted to see. But once you made any declaration that you were theirs -- calling yourself their girlfriend out loud often did it -- they no longer cared for your rights or your opinion. You were merely something else they could control.  
  
Helen had finally learned this lesson, but only when it was too late. Because, after fourteen years of celibacy, she had met a man named Allan. And she had fallen for him. Hard.  
  
Their relationship was not built on the stuff that lasted -- trust, friendship, real love -- but rather lust and passion. There had been a spark at their meeting that Helen could not ignore, and it had soon risen to a roaring flame; but such a fire won't last if it isn't fed stronger fuel. For four months Helen's bed had been frequented by Allan, but her heart had not. After... last night... she realized that she held not a single scrap of real emotion for the man.  
  
But true love or not, Helen had always been cooperative with him, so she had deemed that for once he wouldn't mind if she rejected his advances because she was too tired from that day's hike. But Allan was not so easily dismissed; when he wanted something, he took it -- a fact that Helen hadn't learned until now, because she had always given willingly before.  
  
Helen stared steadfastly at her reflection -- the black eye; the bruising bite mark on her lower lip; the second fist-shaped purple spot lower down on her cheek, with a gash in it where Allan's skull-shaped ring had torn into her flesh. Her thighs, abdomen, and everything in between ached with a fiery throb; she daren't even look at it, so she had put on her ankle-length flower-print dress this morning to cover it up. A long-sleeved red cardigan over the dress had hidden the finger-shaped bruises on her wrists, and a pair of white gloves completed the look. Helen knew she looked like she had come straight out of a Hallmark movie, but she didn't -- couldn't -- care.  
  
She didn't know where Allan was. He had not been in their room when she'd woken up that morning. She knew she should call the police -- but somehow she couldn't bring herself to it. If she had felt any anger, or fear, she might have been motivated to go downstairs and use the phone in the common room to ring up the McLeod Police Department... but she felt nothing at all. She looked at the window and saw only the dirt and grime blocking the light's path, instead of the determined way the light itself struggled through in spite of being rejected. A metaphor for life -- but she was blind to it.  
  
No. She cared nothing for Allan. She should find him -- tell him it was over --  
  
What good would that do? If Allan actually listened to her when she made declarations like that, he wouldn't have done what he did to her last night. He would have heard her telling him to stop...  
  
Helen looked around at her packed belongings -- every last thing she owned, all crammed into two suitcases and a backpack. McLeod was just a vacation. They were supposed to go back to Gloucester today, that's why Helen had packed everything yesterday morning, before they had gone on their final hike in the snowy woods.  
  
But Helen wouldn't need the suitcases where she was going...  
  
She had finally come to a decision. She had found nothing except deceit, betrayal, pain, and suffering in this world; so she would see if the next one had anything better to offer.  
  
Helen took her backpack and one of the suitcases, and opened them. She took her white purse out of the suitcase; then reached into her backpack, felt around, and came up with the one item she owned that Allan did not know about -- a shiny, unused silver pistol with a black grip. Helen checked that it was loaded, rewrapped it in its ragged cloth covering, and tucked it in her purse.  
  
She zipped up her backpack, closed and latched her suitcase with a detached sense of finality and resignation, and left the inn for the last time.  
  
Ignoring the innkeeper's concerned questions, Helen walked through the common room with her head down, trying to hide her disfigured face. She pushed open the font door with a muttered, Need some air. Walking quickly down the street, she watched only the ground in front of her, ignoring her picturesque surroundings and limping slightly with the pain in her thighs.  
  
She wasn't stopped on her way out of the small village of McLeod; no one questioned her hunched poise, or the distinct black eye that couldn't be hidden by looking away. She almost wished someone would take her by the shoulder, spin her around, and march her off to the police headquarters, where she could spill her whole story -- how he'd held her down when she'd tried to push him off, how he'd hurt her more when she begged him to stop... She knew she didn't have the strength to turn and walk there herself. It was the law of inertia. _A moving object will continue moving in a straight course for eternity unless an external force intervenes._ She recited the lines in her head, scientific facts she had learned in boarding school. _E=mc squared. Force equals mass times acceleration. Two plus two equals four...  
_  
Helen took the north-bound road out of McLeod, walking mechanically, in time with the numbers flashing through her head. If she froze to death before she tired enough to stop walking and take out the gun, then so be it. It was only a different escape route -- it led to the same place.  
  
The road was snowed in further north, she knew -- but it had been cleared out up towards those castle ruins. They were such a great tourist attraction that the City of McLeod paid personally for the roads to be kept open; the profit margin of the tourist business all but overcompensated, especially in the holiday season. The site of the ruins themselves would be crowded, but Helen could turn aside onto the walking path in the woods nearby -- where she and Allan had taken their hike yesterday -- and hopefully, if she went deep enough into the trees, no one would hear the shot.  
  
By now Helen was quaking with the cold. She crunched through the snow in nothing but her nice, indoor sandals, and her dress whipped all about her legs in the frigid wind, stinging. The weak sun was dimming even further, smothered by the dark clouds that heralded another snowstorm. People would be leaving the ruins by now, not wanting to be caught by the storm; and anyone in their right minds wouldn't have come to the walking trail at all today, recognizing the beginnings of a blizzard earlier that morning.  
  
Helen trudged on, as the dark pine canopy started to thicken, blocking out what very little light there was left. She started to feel her profound claustrophobia taking over -- she was trapped -- all dark -- tunnel of evergreen needles -- no way out --  
  
She stopped, feeling her joints stiffen instantly in the freezing wind, and took several deep breaths. This was why she had been so tired yesterday afternoon, after she and Allan had walked the length of the trail. It wasn't all that long in and of itself, but her heart pounded furiously with the thought of being trapped in an enclosed space, and her muscles tensed, making it feel as though she had exercised far more than she really had...  
  
She had an instant of doubt, of hesitation. What if she went to Hell when she died -- what if there was an eternity of this? An eternity of cold, tight, small spaces, where she couldn't breath; where she felt like she might die if she _moved_... if she shifted her weight and felt the walls against her, preventing movement, preventing freedom....  
  
So she stood there and took deep, calming breaths, scorching the back of her throat with cold; and when she tried to move again, she found that there were no walls in front of her, or on either side of her; and she had perfect freedom of movement.  
  
Except for the fact that she was frozen in place.  
  
Stifling a cry of fear, she bit her lip -- and instantly cried out in pain instead, having forgotten about the... the bruise there... when he'd bitten... no. No, she wouldn't think about it. Just try to ignore it. Forget it, stifle it, conceal it -- that was the only way she'd be able to move on. She couldn't bear to tell anyone about it -- and besides, who would she tell? She knew no one else... Lewis would have a good laugh; her parents would tell her that it served her right and that the pits of Hell were being prepared for her coming... Margaret... Margaret was silence. What could a corpse say to comfort a dead woman?  
  
In that instant, Helen made her decision. Moving her creaking, unwilling arms with all the strength she had left, she reached into her purse and felt the muzzle of the gun... it was cold, so cold... even her pale, blue-tipped fingers felt the cold of the hard metal, and Helen blanched. But now was not the time for second thoughts. She moved her fingers until she found the grip, and letting her fingers stiffen around it, she lifted it with waning determination out of the bag.  
  
A mist was gathering around her, but she paid it no attention, taking it for the beginning of the storm. As she hefted the gun to her head, she felt -- no, it couldn't be, it must be the adrenaline pumping through her frozen veins. There was no way she could have felt a breath of warmth, not in this chill.  
  
Helen was not an expert with guns, but she did know there was a safety latch you had to undo, so she unbent her thumb enough to pull it back. There was a click that made her flinch. She wondered if it would hurt too much. She didn't like pain, but she had had enough of it now not to mind another discomfort, especially if it served to end all the other aches, bruises and burning flashes of liquid fire...  
  
She closed her eyes tight, feeling a few flakes of snow weasel their way through the overhanging branches and land on her eyelids...  
  
Something indescribably warm and comforting touched her hand, and if her fingers hadn't been frozen stiff in a death grip, she would have dropped the gun. A hoarse yell of surprise and fear burst out of her struggling lungs, and her eyes wrenched open.  
  
The mist had become undeniably hot, but not unpleasantly so. It was formless, pale, and shifty, as if it were nervous -- or maybe as though it were looking her over.  
  
Then a voice spoke, a mild, musical voice that seemed to ebb and drift with the flow of the mist as it swirled around her. Helen wondered if perhaps she had already shot herself and had no memory of it -- if, against all hope, this could be God, come to take her to the Heaven her parents insisted existed...  
  
But the disembodied words seemed to put a stop to those thoughts. Helen's blue-tinted mouth creaked open in vague, distant astonishment as she heard someone distinctly say, Oh, dear. I would be much obliged if you would put that weapon down -- you shouldn't put yourself through this. I've seen it far too often, and it never solves anything. You'll only be reincarnated after the appropriate amount of time -- and suicidals usually get stuck as ants, or frogs.  
  
Helen's mind registered that someone was speaking, but even if she could move, she wouldn't have. The voice sounded male, but it had such a soothing, whispery, clarinet-like quality to it that Helen simply could not imagine a face to go with it.  
  
Helen Corana Levine, said the voice, musing on her name, swirling around her in untold contortions of the fabric of reality itself. The mist seemed to be more visible now; more real.  
  
Where are you? was all she finally managed to croak out.  
  
said the voice. You see me more clearly now because you are closer to me.  
  
But -- she said, confused.  
  
You might call me a god, whispered the voice. God is a name of human invention. We are manifestations of consciousness.  
  
You're God? she breathed, and her thoughts turned again to her parents. Though her voice had not even been loud enough for Helen herself to hear it, the formless voice seemed to understand, and there was a rhythmic whispering that might have been laughter.  
  
I am not the god you are thinking of, said the voice.  
  
Helen was positive she was either mad or dead at this point.  
  
I would tell you something, said the voice, in a tone of voice that commanded her attention, no matter what state she might be in. It is something that very few mortals know, and when I release you from this audience, you will not remember any of my words, because they are not for the average mortal's ears.  
  
But, Helen Corana Levine, you are not an average mortal; so I bequeath this knowledge to you in the hopes that some day we may meet again, when you have grown into yourself -- and you may be allowed to remember.  
  
Yours is not the only reality, Helen Levine. Existence is infinity squared; this universe that you live in extends for forever in every direction, but so do all the other universes in this myriad of imagination you would call life. And there is a catch -- for every thing that is real in one place, there is another world, another universe, where that thing is fictional. Fiction and reality are opposites, and as is the case of all opposites, one cannot exist without the other; light cannot exist without dark, nor love without hate. Consciousness, imagination, is the only bridge that will span the gap between the two sides; imagination is the gray area between the stark contrast of the opposing sides. We are in that gray area now, Helen Levine. As I told you, what you call gods' are manifestations of consciousness. We are made of the gray stuff. We are the shadows between dark and light.  
  
Somewhere, in some other world besides your own, someone is telling _your_ story; and they believe it to be fictional, they believe that they just made it up.' They did not. They merely strayed into the gray area, and saw you here. Have you never thought of strange people? Dreamed of them, perhaps? Even the dullest minds will dream -- gods will visit you in dreams, Helen Levine, and whisper stories into your mind.  
  
Helen felt somehow free of her troubles and her pain, here in the presence of a god.' She lifted her thawed-out hand to try and touch the mist, but it remained gray and impenetrable. The words he spoke she barely heard, but somehow they were seeping into her mind, like a healing salve, warming her thoughts as the heat warmed her flesh. His speech was more than just spoken word; through his straightforward explanation she felt the birth of an idea, like the dawning of a new day. There was no way to describe the way it made her feel, but suddenly she didn't understand why she had not wanted to live. If this was what living truly was, she wanted it to go on forever.  
  
she whispered -- or perhaps she didn't even speak out loud, she couldn't tell.  
  
Why am I telling you this? Why am I speaking to you at all? Why do I want you, and what are my intentions?  
  
said Helen.  
  
You are special, Helen Levine. No, you do not have superpowers -- and you will not save the world. You are not a celebrity, nor do you have the makings of one. To those you know, and those you thought you loved, you are nothing. You have lost yourself, Helen Levine; and you are special because you are being given a second chance.  
  
Long ago, the mortal figure I was based on made a promise; and he broke it, rashly, in a crude and violent way. It was unforgivable, and it remains so. The responsibility for this infidelity was passed on to me, because that is how I was imagined. I intend to make amends for my predecessor's' break of faith; and you, Helen Levine, are to play a vital role.  
  
Why me? she breathed.  
  
Because you have been rejected by your own universe, said the voice quietly. I would send you to another.  
  
You can do that?  
  
I bridge reality and fiction, he said simply. I may help a mortal cross.  
  
But what must I do there?  
  
But Helen received no answer to her last question. The voice of the nameless god swirled into a more powerful tone, whipping up into a full-blown gale instead of his normal whispering breeze.  
  
I will let you choose, said the voice.  
  
To Helen's mind there was not even a choice to make -- but she was appreciative of the god's fairness. I choose to go where you wish me to go, she said, crying out into the swirling wind of the mind's eye.  
  
She braced herself for some great show of magic, for a tornado of power to sweep her off into the sky and dump her in this new world she had been promised; but nothing of the sort happened. The wind began to die down, and the mist that had completely enveloped her was now spreading out, thinning... just as slowly as it had crept up on her, the god was creeping away.  
  
As much as she struggled to remember what that strange voice had told her, it's words were dying away with the mist. She knew she had a purpose now, and she no longer felt the urge to kill herself; but she longed for the return of that blanketing warmth, those clarinet-voiced words...  
  
It was still cold in this new place, but there was no snow or wind; Helen staggered when the pains of her violation stabbed back with full force, but she put on the bravest face she could, turned, and began walking out of the forest in the same direction she had come into it. She had to go by feel, because there was no longer a path. The sun was free here, and broke through the chinks in the forest roof with no trouble; it cast a bright silver, wintry glow all on the bed of frosty pine needles that covered the ground. With every step she took Helen felt more and more able to forget about Allan, and about everything she was running from. Her fingers loosened, and she dropped the pistol on the ground, instantly forgetting about it.  
  
So she worked her way back through the woods, somehow understanding that something was different, though she couldn't place her finger on it -- though she knew that the town she was heading towards was called McLeod, she found that it was difficult to remember what it looked like.  
  
She counted her blessings that she had a good sense of direction, when she emerged from the trees near the ruins. A wooden hut stood perhaps fifty meters away to her left; she was sure she didn't remember that being there. Shrugging, Helen headed for the exit from this run-down tourist trap.  
  
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Helen's newfound feeling of purpose and determination dwindled as she walked along the road towards McLeod, driven out by the piercing cold and the terrible pain of all her injuries. When the town came into sight, she was barely able to stumble along towards it, looking forward to the nice, warm inn. She didn't realize that her face was almost completely blue now, and her aching bruises had become so unbearable that her mind had just blanked them out. She felt numb all over.  
  
She staggered past the outlying houses at the edge of town, oblivious to the fact that they were completely different from the houses she had seen in McLeod before. She followed her unerring sense of direction towards where she knew the inn to be, keeping her eyes half-shut.  
  
In this manner, she walked headlong into someone else on the sidewalk.  
  
said the person. Excuse me.  
  
Helen said nothing, but continued limping on, afraid that if she stopped, she wouldn't be able to move again.  
  
The person she'd bumped into watched her go for a moment over his shoulder, frowned, and turned back towards her, catching up with her in only a few steps.  
  
he said, trying to take her arm. Is everything all right? Do you need any help?  
  
No, I'm fine, chattered Helen. She tried to hold her jaws still, but they shivered away, making her teeth clack.  
  
The man frowned further; he took off his heavy, fur-lined cloak, and settled it over her shoulders. In any other state, Helen would have taken aback by this kindness; but right now all she wanted was to get to the inn.  
  
Where are you going? asked the man. I won't ask what happened to you if you don't want to talk about it... but you shouldn't be out here in this cold. He lifted her face with one hand under her chin, and drew in a sharp breath when he saw the injuries given to her by Allan. Good Lord, he muttered under his breath.  
  
I-I was g-g-going to the B-Black Magick I-Inn, she stammered through her chattering teeth.  
  
He frowned in thought. I'm afraid I haven't heard of it, he said apologetically. I can take you to the Three Broomsticks. They have some lodging there -- it's limited, and you're supposed to have reservations, but I think they can make an exception.  
  
She tried to protest, tried to say she didn't need his help; it was something you learned as a child, not to accept help from strangers.  
  
W-Who are you? she rasped finally.  
  
he said quietly, shaking his head. You're in no condition. Come on, I'll get you to the Three Broomsticks... it's very close... and I'll try to find a mediwizard, if there _are_ any left who haven't been drafted...  
  
He put his arm around her shoulders to steady her, and walked her down the streets to come to a stop in front of a large, two-story building, where a hanging sign proclaimed it to be the Three Broomsticks, Best Butterbeer North of the Thames. Just as the name would indicate, an image of three broomsticks crossing each other was carved onto the sign.  
  
Helen could see very little, and frost was forming on her eyelashes; but she could tell that her rescuer's face, though fairly young, was drawn and worried as if from constant stress. His hair was almost the same shade of brown as hers, but his was streaked and flecked through with gray. With a faint jingle of bells somewhere inside the building, he opened the doors; Helen's thoughts were fading out along with her sight, and she couldn't really see the stairs she was led up, or the room she was taken into. She thought she remembered lying down on a warm, soft bed, but after that, everything was black.  
  
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Helen woke to the sound of a woman's voice, murmuring to herself as she mopped Helen's forehead with something cool.  
  
My, you've had a nasty time. I'd like to know who put you through this... why, I think I should forget all about the Ministry rules; I'd give that man a piece of my mind, I dare say... _and_ I'd get him thrown in Azkaban, what's what. Hmm. Oh, I say, I believe she's coming to.  
  
Helen squinted at the brightness of the room, thought it was only lit by dim candle light. She could make out the blurry form of someone sitting by her bed; a woman, rather short and plump, in what looked like a black dress.  
  
Hello, dear, she said in a low voice. Do you know where you are?  
  
Helen coughed once, trying to clear her throat. I... was going to McLeod, she muttered hoarsely. A man brought me here...  
  
Yes, Remus found you wandering about in the cold, said the plump woman kindly. He came and got me as soon as he could. My name is Poppy Pomfrey, I'm the school nurse at Hogwarts. I'm afraid that I'm the only doctor around at the moment; every other licensed mediwitch or -wizard has gone off to help in the war.  
  
Helen's mind whirled. Wizards? Hogwarts? she asked, confused. Where am I? What is this place?  
  
You're in Hogsmeade, dear, said Poppy Pomfrey. You're probably just a bit confused right now. You've been feverish for a full day -- that nasty cut on your cheek got infected. I've healed you all up, now; bruises and cuts are far easier than broken bones, and even those I can fix in a few hours. I don't mean to brag, I merely say that I can. You have to be quite good to work at a wizarding school -- what those children think of, these days -- falling off their brooms at fifty feet, dueling in the middle of the night, I say. Hmph.  
  
Helen tried to sit up, but Poppy pushed her back down gently.  
  
No, dear, don't try to move. You'll be a bit sore and dizzy for a day or so, and I'd recommend staying in bed for a few days more. It can never hurt to be cautious.  
  
What's a wizard? Helen blurted stupidly. Of course she knew what a wizard was, but why this woman was talking about them as though they were _real_, common, everyday things...  
  
Helen's vision was clearing, and she could see that the woman looked startled. Oh, my goodness, don't you know? I hadn't thought -- oh, dear. Well, for a Muggle you certainly have something special about you, if you were able to find Hogsmeade. It's Unplottable, for heaven's sakes!  
  
A Muggle? said Helen weakly.  
  
Oh, that's the wizarding name for non-magical people... oh, this complicates things... I've already owled the Department of Domestic Services, but if you're a Muggle... well, I doubt they'll come, anyway. Not for a while yet. The entire Ministry is wrapped up in the Dark Lord business.  
  
Helen gave up. She was too exhausted and confused to try and get any proper answers from this Pomfrey woman. She felt herself slipping back off into the dark realm of sleep, but before she went, she was determined to ask one more thing.  
  
Where... where's the man who brought me here? she said, her mind slowing to a sluggish pace as she drifted off.  
  
Remus? He had to leave yesterday -- off to deal with the Ministry again. I told him I'd help, but he said he could handle it... he always has tried to take on too much... he's had a hard life, you know. Poppy saw that Helen's eyelids were flickering, and lowered her voice. Go on back to sleep, dear. Sleep's the best thing a body needs to heal.  
  
Helen gave a weak nod and fell asleep before her eyes had closed all the way.  
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A/N: One other thing. I know absolutely nothing about any location wheresoever in the British Isles. Scotland, London, any of the cities I named, anything. I know NOTHING about them -- I live in Mississippi, in the US of A, and I have not so much as seen a single picture of London. Everything I say about England, I made up off the top of my head. I'm sorry if I got everything horribly wrong. I didn't really research for this story... I'm more used to writing stories where I can just center the plot around someplace completely fictional, like in Lord of the Rings.  
  
I am sincerely sorry if my mutilated descriptions of any real places have gotten on someone's nerves, or have caused anyone to stop reading the story out of exasperation over the stupid American writer.  
  
Of course, to any shreds of audience I still may have -- please drop a review, and keep reading! :)


	2. Bad Moon Rising

A/N: I'm glad I didn't drive too many people off with my ignorance of foreign countries. Hrm... nothing much's been happening... school is going very well, it's actually _fun,_ which is something I hadn't counted on. Maybe being deprived of it for 4 years improved my opinion of it.  
  
There was nothing particularly interesting about the writing of this chapter: it just happened, easily and painlessly. Sure, it's good when that happens -- but it's also kind of boring. *shrug* Well, the story isn't boring, at least. As a matter of fact it has far more action than my other stories...  
  
Well, enjoy!  
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Chapter Two: Bad Moon Rising  
  
_I see a bad moon risin'  
I see trouble on the way  
I see earthquakes and lightnin'  
I see a bad town today  
  
Don't go round tonight  
For it's bound to take your life  
There's a bad moon on the rise  
  
I hear hurricanes a blowin'  
I know the end is comin' soon  
I feel rivers overflowin'  
I hear the voice of rage and ruin  
  
Don't go round tonight  
For it's bound to take your life  
There's a bad moon on the rise  
  
Hope you have got your things together  
Hope you are quite prepared to die  
Looks like we're in for nasty weather  
One I is thinkin' for the night  
  
Don't go round tonight  
For it's bound to take your life  
There's a bad moon on the rise  
_-- Bad Moon Rising' by Creedence Clearwater Revival  
  
Helen's days in Hogsmeade were some of the strangest and most ethereal days she had ever experienced. Poppy Pomfrey's healing salves (or as she called them, potions') were just short of miraculous; Helen couldn't even remember how much pain she had been in that day she had gone out in the snow. It all seemed so long ago. She asked Poppy once more about McLeod, when she woke up on Friday afternoon; but the nurse told her that she didn't know of any place by that name, and Helen was simply left to wonder.  
  
Poppy explained to her all about magic, and how the wizards of the world had their own government and history, that had been kept secret from the non-magic -- or Muggle' -- community for thousands of years. She muttered all the while about how the Department of Magical Law Enforcement was going to be terribly angry with her for breaking some clause or other of the Muggle Secrecy Act, and how a squad of Obliviators would probably come and erase Helen's entire memory of her stay at the wizarding town; but still, the nurse seemed happy to have someone to talk to. It seemed that at the school where she worked, she hardly ever had time to simply sit around and chat with the other staff. She went on and on about some mysterious war the teachers were always going off to help with, and about how regiments of older students were being trained to fight.  
  
Helen had a hard time accepting everything Poppy told her, and when she was finally deemed to be fit enough to go downstairs to get something to eat, she watched her surroundings with wide, incredulous eyes. She spent an entire hour watching the kitchen staff cook using magic -- levitating pans all around, tapping the stoves with their wands to get them the right temperatures, conjuring sauces and magicking the dishes to wash themselves. It was so amazing that Helen all but forgot about Allan...  
  
By Sunday, all that remained to remind her of the way she had been mistreated was a small, pale scar where his ring had cut her cheek. When questioned, Poppy had said it would be gone by the next day; and it was.  
  
To Helen, this change of fortune was almost too good to be true. She rarely talked to anyone, refusing to answer Poppy's questions about what had happened to her before she had come here, but she still had plenty to wonder at. Each day brought new customers, and Helen took to sitting at a corner table during the afternoons, to watch them all. Most were normal humans, but Poppy, when she visited to check on how Helen was doing, was able to point out a few oddities -- this man was a wizard, but this other was a warlock, who used more refined and sophisticated magic than wizards; that woman over there in the corner was actually a hag; the young, pale boy ordering what looked like red wine was one of the rare vampires who opposed the Dark Lord,' the being who was apparently the leader of the bad side.'  
  
Helen found it hard to imagine a world where it could really be so clear-cut: the good guys versus the bad guys, black and white, no questions asked. She quietly accepted everything Poppy told her, but inside she wondered... had anyone tried to _negotiate?_ What was this war being fought over, anyway? This Dark Lord sounded a lot like Hitler, but even Hitler had been leading a country of repressed, mistreated people to what he claimed was their freedom. Sure, he had taken the wrong path, used the wrong methods, but underneath all the horrors that he had committed to the world, he had had a point... hadn't he?  
  
-----------  
  
On a dreary-skied Tuesday almost two weeks after she had arrived in Hogsmeade, Helen ventured a question to Poppy, who had come to check up on her' once again -- though Helen suspected she had really come to talk.  
  
Who was that man who brought me in here, anyway?  
  
Poppy was startled out of her thoughts, as she absently watched the hag in the corner (a regular customer) wolf down a dish of something that Helen didn't want to think about. Looking into Helen's eyes critically, she shook her head.  
  
His name is Remus Lupin, she said shortly. He's... been a patient of mine for years now. I'm afraid I have a strict policy of client confidentiality, she added quickly, when Helen opened her mouth questioningly. Especially in that poor boy's case, Poppy murmured under her breath.  
  
Helen was now dying to know what was wrong with him -- it was a natural trait of hers; she had always been overly curious, and sometimes too nosy for her own good. But she chose to keep quiet this time, seeing as she had no real _reason_ for wanting to know.  
  
Well, then, said Poppy a moment later, standing up from Helen's table. I had better get back to the school. There's a Quidditch match starting in a bit, and people are _always_ falling off their brooms, or getting elbowed in the face... honestly, I don't understand what they see in that sport... Poppy bustled away, tsking. She called a goodbye to Madam Rosmerta, the most popular waitress, over her shoulder; and then she was out the door, leaving Helen alone to her thoughts.  
  
Helen was feeling rather restless today; she'd been inside this building for nearly two weeks, and the only thing keeping her from going outside was the fact that she didn't have any cold-weather clothes. She'd been lent a pair of wizard's robes by Rosmerta, who had said that her Muggle-style dress would probably startle the customers; but it was no better than her own clothes for keeping the cold out.  
  
She eventually decided to find Rosmerta and ask if she had a coat Helen could borrow. It was almost the four o'clock tea break for the waitresses, anyway; she shouldn't be too hard to catch.  
  
Helen couldn't say that she liked Rosmerta that much, but they wore the same size, and they had exchanged a few words here and there. Rosmerta, Helen felt, seemed a bit insincere; a bit modeled. _She's probably never had to deal with any Lewises or Allans in her life,_ Helen thought bitterly as she spotted the tall, slender woman walking towards the kitchens, looking a bit frazzled as she wrenched off her four-inch turquoise heels and let her feet breathe.  
  
Helen approached her just as she was pouring herself a cup of hot water from the stainless steel kettle that had been set on the stove. Rosmerta looked up, her expression irritable; she'd let her pretty facade drop for once.  
  
What is it? she snapped, picking out a tea bag and dropping it in the cup, expertly holding onto the hanging tab with two fingers and leaving her other hand free.  
  
I was hoping I could go outside today, said Helen mildly, but I haven't got my coat. Do you have anything I might borrow?  
  
Rosmerta hmphed. she said, with a derisive hint that Helen was meant not to miss. I don't have a coat. You can use my cloak -- it's there by the door. It's the purple one.  
  
Helen thanked her, to which Rosmerta did not reply. Turning to the kitchen door, she saw a row of pegs on the wall that she hadn't previously noticed. She quickly spotted Rosmerta's cloak, hanging right next to the door -- it was a violent, electric shade of purple that made Helen's eyes hurt to look at. Somehow it seemed fitting that it belonged to Rosmerta. Helen slipped it off its peg and left, throwing it awkwardly over her shoulders; it was lined with purple-dyed fur, and was very heavy.  
  
With a sense of freedom and finality, Helen pushed open the front door of the pub and stepped out onto the curb.  
  
The cobbled street and the roofs of all the buildings were lightly dusted in the kind of powdery snow that makes for very messy snowball fights. Helen allowed herself a small smile as she breathed in the crisp air; it was pleasant now, instead of painful. She walked down the street for a few blocks, peering in shop windows at the many oddities used by wizards -- brooms, for instance. She could imagine them to be useful as transportation, but for _sports?  
  
_Helen couldn't stay outside for very long, having somewhat overestimated the strength of her recovery; but the fresh air provided a perfect atmosphere for her to stand and think. Looking up into the steel-gray, cloudless sky, she wondered... how had she gotten here? She was beginning to doubt that there had ever been a town called McLeod where she had taken her Christmas vacation with Allan. In fact, after such a quick, nearly painless recovery from... from what Allan had... done...  
  
No, she thought grimly, she could not dismiss Allan as a dream. There was definitely a missing link somewhere -- she _had_ been in McLeod, but something had happened that Wednesday she had gone out into the woods, something that had altered the world, though she didn't know how.  
  
Helen turned her thoughts away from this mystery and tried to concentrate on something else. A gray, blurred fragment of memory surfaced in her mind: that man, Remus Lupin, who had lent her his cloak and brought her help when she needed it most... she wished she could find him, thank him. What was it Poppy had said? _He's had a hard life... he always tries to take on too much...'  
  
_Helen smiled slightly. This Remus sounded a lot like her.  
  
An involuntary shiver took her by surprise, and she realized how cold it was. Looking back down to earth, she hastened inside the Three Broomsticks -- the pub that, at this rate, seemed to be becoming her new home.  
  
---------  
  
Over the next week, the conversations Helen listened in on at the bar turned darker and more nervous. Shops were closing up all down the street and across the town; a rumor of war spread throughout the atmosphere. Poppy's checkups' ceased, and Helen was left to fend for herself. Rosmerta had given her an acid green cloak of her own, but only very reluctantly and with a pointed aside about poor helpless Muggles who had to be coddled. Helen got the distinct feeling that Rosmerta had been ordered to give Helen the cloak by her boss, the innkeeper: a pudgy, generally easy-tempered woman who could turn into quite the formidable opponent when crossed.  
  
Helen walked outside for a brief time every day, getting herself reaccustomed to the cold; she explored the sweets shop thoroughly, and longed to try some of the dozens of different types of chocolate, though she had no money to buy it with. She was surprised when Honeyduke's did not close down like all the other stores. Apparently it was a family business, and the owner declared to anyone who would listen that they had never closed, even in the midst of the Dark Lord's previous reign; and they weren't about to start giving in now, before they'd even been attacked.  
  
Helen's understanding of this Dark Lord,' and the war everyone was so intent on, remained vague and patchy. Poppy had explained very little, and Helen was not really on speaking terms with anyone else. All she gathered was that there was some hero, Harry Potter, who was expected to fight and destroy the Dark Lord for good. For some reason, Helen could swear the name Harry Potter sounded familiar -- but what was strange was that she knew she had never heard it before in this place; so she must have heard it in the place she had come from before, the place where McLeod existed. She was terribly confused by it all, and she tried to avoid any thought of McLeod for that very reason.  
  
But besides the usual gossip of current news, Helen learned quite a lot of the Hogsmeade town history by listening into the more tourist-y conversations. Someone looking at a wizard brochure (which spoke enthusiastically about the locations it showed off, and flashed ads across the bottom of its pages) had commented on some places that had served as seats of various revolutionary governments, restaurants that had won culinary awards, and shops that had been visited by famous wizards and witches. It sounded just like every historical town -- only with magic involved.  
  
For instance, on her way to her own corner one Friday morning, Helen passed a table occupied by what was unmistakably a young son, his mother, and his grandmother. The grandmother seemed to be a local resident of Hogsmeade, whose daughter and grandson had come to visit her; at least that was Helen's conclusion from their talk. The grandmother was holding the boy in her lap and telling him a story, and he was listning wide-eyed, while his mother smiled and tried not to laugh and ruin the effect.  
  
-- big house down the road. You seen it? The little boy nodded, mouth open; and his grandmother leaned down as if she were departing some great secret. Well, that great big old house was built years and years ago, but no one would ever _live_ in it, see -- so it started to attract ghosts. The little boy gasped, and his mother bit her lip to stop from smiling. The grandmother's eyes twinkled. On every full moon you can hear them shrieking and rattling their chains... but they never come out, no. If that door were ever to be opened, all those ghosts would come out, and they would come, and get you... a little morsel, eh... The boy started to laugh happily as his grandmother tickled his chest.  
  
Helen's throat tightened, and she walked quietly away, trying not to think of her own family.  
  
----------  
  
That night as Helen lay still in her bed, trying to get to sleep, she thought she heard the howling of a pack of wolves -- they were near, so very close to her....  
But she tossed uneasily, and told herself it was a dream.  
  
----------  
  
Helen was nervous in her room for the next two nights, and did not leave the inn during the day; the vision of the grandmother, her eyes gleaming gleefully, telling the story of the haunted house down the street, was vivid and fresh in Helen's mind. But on the second night, her tenseness was not merely brought on by the troublesome memories of her own dysfunctional family, or the disturbing dream she'd had two nights ago; there was something in the air, something calling her...  
  
Something that needed help.  
  
She couldn't explain how she knew it, but she did. Someone was in trouble.  
  
She got out of bed, shuffling along silently in her nightclothes. At first she thought of going into the second-floor bathroom, to get a drink of water in the hopes that it might ease her nerves; but she hesistated and turned back at the door. Walking to her window, she pulled aside the curtains and opened the shutters, instantly shivering in the cold air that swept inside.  
  
She leaned forward against the sill and looked out, wrapping her hands around her arms and rubbing vigorously to keep them warm. The town lay spread out beneath her, a myriad of twinkling lights from torches left out on stoops, or candles lit in windows. It was much dimmer than even the darkest night in Gloucester, Helen's old home. The ground seemed almost to reflect the stars in the sky above, like a dark pool.  
  
The stars themselves were bright and clear, with no clouds in the sky to block their light. An enormous, mother-of-pearl moon shone down on the rooftops, providing an almost unreal-looking setting. The lone shack on the hill three blocks away was clearly visible in the moonlight; it looked distorted, somehow, like it had had an extra room attached to it. It took a moment for Helen to realize that it wasn't a strange growth; it was scaffolding and tarp, protruding from one wall, where someone was apparently doing some construction.  
  
_And the house started to attract ghosts...  
  
_Perhaps that was what she felt; ghosts. Helen laughed uneasily at the thought, and began to close her window.  
  
She had just turned away when she heard the first scream.  
  
_At every full moon you can hear them shrieking and rattling their chains...  
  
_Helen looked nervously over her shoulder at the closed window. She listened hard, and sure enough, there came another howl of agony -- but where Helen had thought that a shrieking ghost would sound, well, more _ghostly,_ this scream sounded disturbingly... human.  
  
A third cry made her jump with fear; but underneath that predictable reaction, she was starting to feel concerned, and slightly shocked. That was, beyond doubt, a human voice out there -- so why was no one making a move to help?  
  
Against her better judgement, Helen grabbed her black robes and pulled them on over her nightgown, then flung the green cloak over her shoulders. She pushed open her door and tiptoed into the hall, feeling her apprehension building to an extreme. Blood thudded in her ears, and she hadn't felt this much adrenaline rushing through her veins since... since she had touched that icy metal... since she had nearly given up hope, and taken her own life...  
  
The stairs creaked, and she jumped. She shouldn't be doing this. She should go right back to her room; should burrow under the nice, warm covers of her bed, and ignore the way her conscience took her stomach by the metaphoric lapel and shook it until it rattled and clenched with guilt...  
  
No, she couldn't stand that. Not again. That was how she had felt when her sister had died; like she should have _done_ something, should have gotten Margaret some help before it was too late...  
  
The scream was muffled by the walls of the building this time, but it still made Helen's blood run cold. She wondered what she was getting herself into. If no one else was coming to the aid of whoever was in pain, shouldn't that say that they knew something she didn't? Maybe the villagers were aware of some danger that, if she had known it, would have convinced her to turn back now and drop the matter.  
  
But she opened the door anyway, so scared and yet so absolutely _determined,_ that she had disconnected herself from her body; at this point she was certain that she had not told her hand to move, but it turned the knob despite the little voice of fear screaming at it to stop.  
  
Helen turned left, and began heading towards the center of town, where the shack rested on a steep rise surrounded by an iron fence. She broke into an ungainly sort of half-jog at the sound of an extended, wailing sob; and as she turned the corner, she saw it, its condensation-damp shingles glinting in the silver moonlight -- the place the villagers called the Shrieking Shack.  
  
Helen's steps faltered. In the dreary gray light of a winter's day, the building seemed to frown uninvitingly. At night, however, the Shack looked much more menacing; illuminated like some cave of untold horrors out of the darker breed of fairy tale. Helen hesitated, unsure she could go through with this -- but the cry came again, sounding so pained and yet so sorrowful that the emotion went beyond words; it drew Helen onwards with an aching tug at the deepest, most private levels of her heart.  
  
Her cloak billowed back as she clambered over the fence and up the hill, allowing the cold air in; she shuddered and snatched the fabric closer around her. At long last she came close enough to the shack to touch it, if she reached her arm's length; she could hear someone breathing in heavy, ragged gasps inside, as if struggling to ignore their pain. Helen took a step forward unconsciously, and touched the wall.  
  
she called in a quavering voice.  
  
A quickly stifled yell made her jump back. She could have sworn it had had more than just pain in it; it had been fearful as well, warning her against something...  
  
Helen looked around quickly and the construction site caught her eye. Dashing over, she pulled aside a stack of timber, straining her back and arms until they burned just to shift the pile a few feet. The tool box she had hoped to find was there, behind a support; even wizards couldn't build houses completely by magic. A splinter caught the skin of her arm as she reached in, drawing out a bead of blood; but Helen ignored it and came up with the first heavy thing she could find: an iron crowbar.  
  
She couldn't force her way under or through the tight maze of wooden scaffolding, so she half-stumbled to the nearest boarded window instead, and dug the crowbar between two slats, pushing down with all her might. Her breath was coming in gasps, but she pushed harder, trying to wrench the board off.  
  
_If that door were ever to be opened, all those ghosts would get out...  
  
_She could feels nails loosening --  
  
She thought she heard another moan, but it seemed deeper this time; gravelly, more like a growl. Her mind was going in circles now, and for a moment she had no idea what she was doing. She wanted to be back in her room; she wished she'd never heard anything, never even looked out the window... but she had to repay Margaret... a life for a life...  
  
A screech of rusty metal said she'd gotten a nail loose, and as she shoved for one final time, putting her entire weight on the crowbar, the wooden plank crunched and splintered outward, broken.  
  
With the resistance suddenly relieved, Helen's weight overbalanced her and she tumbled forward onto the frost-crusted grass. She fell hard onto the crowbar, which she still held in her white-knuckled hands; the wind was knocked out of her, and she lay still for a moment, stunned at what she had just done.  
  
There was a soft snarl from inside the house. Helen was reminded of what she had come here to do, and she scrambled to her feet, ready to try for getting off another board.  
  
She was barely upright when something slammed into the wall from the inside. Helen staggered backwards, as it penetrated her whirling mind that the howls were no longer even vaguely human...  
  
The board she had splintered tore apart even further as whatever was inside the building threw its weight against the window once again. Helen raised her crowbar, unsure of what to do; but she had no time to think, because the board could not withstand a third blow --  
  
The window burst apart; Helen shouted and raised her arm to her eyes to ward off flying fragments; searing pain tore into her forearm, yanking her down --  
  
She opened her eyes just in time to see those of an animal staring back, fierce with anger. She screamed again, but it was too late; the creature had sunk its teeth deep into her arm, and now it was pulling away -- it was going to tear a piece of her off with it --  
  
Without thinking, she raised the crowbar in her free left hand and hit the creature as hard over the back as she could. It opened its mouth in an angry howl, and she yanked her arm away quickly; she rolled over, trying to get away, to put some distance between them so she could get to her feet and raise the crowbar to use as a weapon...  
  
And as she flipped onto her back, she caught sight of the moon. Round, pale, full of malice; glinting down on her in her moment of fear and danger, unmoved.  
  
Helen rolled onto her knees just as the beast leapt forward to strike, but as she lifted her crowbar, something tore through her head like a fiery claw; pure agony overwhelmed her; pain like she'd never felt before. A scream burst out of her and she dropped her weapon, putting both hands to her head, trying to hold it together as it felt like it was flying apart --  
  
She recognized her own screams -- they were the same as those she had heard from the shack earlier --  
  
Nearly passing out from the pain, Helen fell forward onto the grass; the attacking creature's momentum carried it right over her back, though she felt its claws ripping into her robes as it landed near her feet. Snarling, it dropped low onto its haunches and slunk around her, waiting for a chance to strike.  
  
Helen could no longer pay attention to it; she felt her joints shrieking as they shifted of their own accord; nerves scraped together, causing a feeling like a thousand hot knives piercing her limbs in a hundred different places. Her clothes tangled around parts of her that she never knew existed -- _a tail?_ -- and a burning, itchy sensation, like sunburn that's been thoroughly scratched, spread down her neck and across her back.  
  
At the same time, her thoughts grew less concerned about the unrelenting pain and more worried about the other creature -- she was angry with it for hurting her -- a snarl escaped her throat, and for a split second she was shocked at the sound; but in moments, her mind had become completely free of any sane, human thoughts.  
  
Struggling to stand, the animal that had been Helen whipped and craned her neck around until her sharp white fangs caught on the fabric of her robe and cloak. She ripped and clawed at them until she had managed to disentangle herself. The other creature watched curiously, baring its teeth as it stayed low to the ground.  
  
And as they sprang at each other, tearing with their heavy, deadly paws, the moon hung unfeeling in the velvet-black sky, surrounded by hard pinpricks of light, like ground glass; and for ever more would a woman named Helen Corana Levine loathe the sight of it.  
----------  
  
_Bad Moon Rising' belongs to whoever it belongs to, a record company or something, but it most certainly does not belong to me. It's by Creedence Clearwater Revival and can be found on the album Chronicle.' Its most memorable appearance (at least to me) was in the film An American Werewolf In London, where it played over the really cool and gruesome transformation scene (Rick Baker rocks!)._


	3. Dawn

A/n: Not much to say, except to thank the few people who have reviewed! *giant hugs to all reviewers* Espcially Emily and Saerry Snape. I wasn't expecting either of you to read it in the first place... so it was a great surprise!  
  
Enjoy...  
  
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Chapter Three: Dawn  
  
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_The heart is a bloom, shoots up through the stony ground  
But there's no room, no space to rent in this town  
You're out of luck and the reason that you had to care  
The traffic is stuck, and you're not moving anywhere  
You thought you'd found a friend to take you out of this place  
Someone you could lend a hand in return for grace  
  
It's a beautiful day  
The sky falls, and it feels like  
It's a beautiful day  
Don't let it get away  
-------------  
_  
Something warm was pressing against her back. There was a strangely uncomfortable feeling, a distant ache...  
  
For a moment Helen thought that she had only dreamed about going to a world where magic existed, and that she had simply woken up in her room in the McLeod inn, with Allan beside her. Her eyes flew open in fear.  
  
But no, it couldn't be. Though her sight was blurry, she could see that she was surrounded by something green and swaying, and that she lay not on a matress, but on bare grass... _cold...  
_  
Everything was so cold...  
  
Except for the thing behind her.  
  
Fragmented memories of the previous night slammed into her suddenly, making her feel dizzy. She groaned and tried to shift her arm up to her head, to massage her temples; but she froze when her grainy vision registered dark red instead of the pink that her arm ought to be. She blinked furiously until her sight cleared, and she saw --  
  
Blood. Her arm was covered in dried blood.  
  
She twisted her neck, ignoring the sharp pain that shot through her head, right behind her eyes; she looked down at herself and saw that blood was the only thing she wore. She couldn't even see the injuries themselves underneath the clotted fluid...  
  
The fact that she was otherwise naked took a minute to sink in. Helen moaned and clutched her head as she tried to sit up, biting her lip against the pain of at least four deep cuts and twice as many bruises. She wrapped her arms around herself protectively, trying in vain to fight the cold breeze that stirred the branches of the tree she sat under.  
  
Something shifted behind her, stirring into life. Helen turned her head carefully, to avoid the dizzyness that threatened to take over. Fearful and reluctant, she looked over her shoulder...  
  
It was a man, a few years older than her, his brown hair streaked with gray. She recognized him instantly; the man who had all but saved her life a month ago, who had found her somewhere safe to stay and brought the only doctor that was to be had in the entire area rushing to her aid.  
  
Remus. Remus Lupin.  
  
His eyelids fluttered, and he covered his face with one hand, groaning. With a strangled yell of shock and fear, Helen surged to her feet and tried to run; but her legs could not support her weight, and she stumbled and fell, nearly twisting her ankle.  
  
Remus' eyes shot open and he sat bolt upright, looking around with fear just as evident on his face as it was on Helen's.  
  
Their eyes met.  
  
he whispered, his eyes going wide.   
  
Helen struggled to get away once more, dragging herself up on unwilling arms, trying to pull herself as far from him as she could... _this couldn't be happening... not again, not this soon..._ Her memory of being attacked was vague, and she didn't understand what was happening. She had been attacked by some kind of animal... not a human...  
  
Wait! Stop!  
  
Remus had gotten to his knees with more than a little effort, and he grabbed her wrist, pulling her hand out from under her. She fell forward again, reopening a cut on her chin. She couldn't help it; she was sobbing uncontrollably, and all she wanted was to be anywhere else, anyplace besides here, and with any other company. Her face was red-hot with shame at her nudity, and she tried to hide herself behind a thick root protruding from the ground.  
  
She felt Remus take her right arm gently, rubbing off some of the dried blood. She closed her eyes tightly; but he let go after a moment.  
  
Can't believe it, she heard him mutter hoarsely. Can't be. Just dreaming. Just another bloody dream...  
  
Looking up at his face, she was taken aback to see that tears were streaking down his cheeks; he looked as though he was in shock.  
  
He fell silent after a few minutes, and they lay huddled like that for a long time; separated by the roots of the willow they had slept under, quiet and miserable. Helen's memory was so muddled, and she herself was so confused, that she simply allowed her mind to go blank. A small part of her wanted to get up and run as far away as she could; but she couldn't move. The breeze died down after a while, but it was still freezing, and Helen felt her joints stiffening and her cuts throbbing with a steady ache.  
  
After what must have been half an hour, though it felt like eternity to Helen, Remus spoke.  
  
What's your name? he asked quietly.  
  
Helen hesitated, unsure of whether she trusted him. Then she cowered mentally, realizing that it didn't matter whether he was trustworthy; it was already too late to run. she replied, choking back any further tears. Helen Corana Levine.  
  
he repeated, carefully avoiding looking at her. Beautiful name. She looked up to see him swallow hard. He blinked twice, and held the back of his hand to his nose, trying valiantly not to cry.  
  
Come on, he said suddenly, pushing himself up slightly. We should get into the tunnel entrance. It'll block the cold. Can you move?  
  
Taken quite aback, Helen tried to sit up straight and found that she could, creakingly. she muttered.  
  
It should be on the other side of the trunk -- an opening between the roots. I don't want you to freeze to death. Remus finally chanced a look at her face, but neither of them could muster any expression other than that of blank shock.  
  
Helen did as she was told, and sure enough she found a gap between two roots just out of her sight on the other side of the thick willow trunk. She slid inside and found that Remus had been right -- it was still cool, but there wouldn't be any danger of hypothermia down here; it was too well insulated.  
  
A moment later, after Helen had had a chance to move a good piece away into the tunnel under the fine, dangling roots of the plants above, Remus dropped inside as well. He put his arms around his knees and curled up as tight as he could right next to the entrance, allowing Helen free access to the deeper parts of the tunnel, where it was warmer. She hesitated, and wondered for an instant if she should tell him that she wouldn't mind if he came further inside... but instead she bit her lip and sat still, accepting his good manners with silence.  
  
_You're on the road, but you've got no destination  
You're in the mud in the maze of your imagination  
You love this town, even if that doesn't ring true  
You've been all over, and it's been all over you  
  
It's a beautiful day  
Don't let it get away  
_  
After that Helen remembered very little; she supposed she must have slipped off into something of a light doze. All she could think of was the chill, which wound and slunk down the tunnel despite the layer of earth separating her from the wind; the bare, well-trodden dirt ground into her bare backside and all she felt like doing was putting her head down and crying. At intervals her eyes lingered on the mysterious man who seemed to be her savior and her curse, but she couldn't see his face: his gaze was fixed steadily on the tunnel entrance, the cold clarity of the sunlight and the harsh world above ground. He seemed to be waiting.  
  
Helen had closed her eyes for she knew not how long, when faint voices tickled the edges of her hearing, and she struggled to wake up, though the cold kept dragging her down.  
  
Good Lord, Remus, there you are... Why didn't you wait in the house?... it's freezing out here...  
  
Bit someone, Poppy. Helen. Her name, she said...  
  
What are you going on about? Poor dear, it must have been a rough night...  
  
Helen's eyes jerked open, as she recognized the voice and manner of Poppy Pomfrey, the nurse who had all but saved her life.  
  
Come on, back to the castle. A day or two in the hospital wing and I can have you back in class, no trouble...  
  
No, you're not listening! Down the tunnel... I... I told her to try and get warm... I think I bit her... don't remember much...  
  
Oh, Remus, said Poppy's voice quietly, almost too softly for Helen to hear. She sounded instantaneously frightened, sympathetic, and stern. Oh, dear... here... here's a cloak, now, wait here, I'll go and look...  
  
There was a brief scraping and a thump, and before Helen could register what was happening, the pale face of Poppy Pomfrey, flushed by cold and fear, was right in front of her eyes. Poppy looked straight into Helen's eyes, and murmured, There now. Don't be afraid...  
  
Helen wanted to scream. She wanted to get up right there, to stand as tall as she could -- and she towered over Poppy, she knew -- and shout the nurse down, shriek at her that how could she _not be afraid_, she was terrified!, and if Pomfrey could experience as much pain and suffering in ten minutes as Helen had felt in her whole life, then see if _she_ could hear the words _don't be afraid'_ and not be sent into a panic!  
  
But she didn't. She sat where she was, and curled up even tighter and smaller than she ever had before.  
  
Through the next few minutes, Helen distantly understood that she was being helped to her feet, supported out of the tunnel, and handed a thick, wonderfully warming knee-length cloak. She wrapped it tightly around herself, immensely grateful for the cover. The sun was still low in the pale wintry sky, and it was obviously still very early morning. Helen wondered how long she'd really been in that tunnel.  
  
Poppy stood between Remus and Helen, supporting both of them with her stout little form, though they were both nearly a head taller than her.  
  
Helen looked up through eyes that stung with cold, and was honestly surprised to see that they were walking towards the castle ruins that, for some reason, Helen still thought of as a big tourist location. Poppy had told her that the tumbled-down old castle was actually a fully functional school, and that its outward appearance to Muggles was that of a ruin; one of the many deterrents that surrounded the building.  
  
Helen blinked. She was a Muggle -- and she knew that she had seen ruins here many times before.  
  
Why could she now clearly see an enormous, turretted fortress?  
  
----------_  
It was a beautiful day  
Beautiful day  
Don't let it get away_  
----------  
  
Deja vu all over again.  
  
The solid, steady ache. The slight dizziness when she moved her head. The firmly enforced bed rest -- and all the waiting, alone, with no one there even to hold her hand.  
  
But no one had ever been there to hold her hand, had they? No one, for her entire life.  
  
If a djinn had magically appeared and granted Helen her heart's wish, the only thing she would have asked for was someone to hold her hand. It didn't matter who it was. It didn't matter if they said anything. She just wanted, so badly, to have _someone.  
_  
Instead she gathered up a fistful of sheet and clenched her hand tight around it. And she slept, waiting for the ache to go away on its own.  
  
-----------  
_Touch me, take me to that other place  
Teach me, I know I'm not a hopeless case  
_-----------  
  
Here now, drink this, said Madam Pomfrey gently, holding Helen's head up.  
  
Helen accepted the goblet with surprisingly steady hands. She got one small whiff of the odor of the stuff she was supposed to drink, however, and she nearly spilled the whole thing.  
  
she said, making a face. That's disgusting. It smells like rotting cabbages.  
  
Poppy gave her a patient grimace of resignation, and began to explain. It may taste terrible, but it will cure you much faster than any Muggle item around. I'm afraid the flavor comes from an infusion of --  
  
No, no, don't tell me, interrupted Helen. You'll make it worse.  
  
Just drink up, the nurse sighed. She left Helen's bedside, closing the curtains on the way. Helen supposed she'd only spent about a day in the hospital wing,' as Poppy called it; but it felt much longer.  
  
Helen weighed her chances. If she left the potion untouched, Poppy would certainly notice; but she could at least put it off for a while. Give herself some time to gather the courage to gulp it. Yes, she'd do that, at least. She reached over and put the goblet on the bedside table, then laid back against her pillows and sighed, trying to let herself sink into a blissful trance-like state, where she couldn't remember anything, where her thoughts were faded and muted, as if a translucent white filter had been placed over them.  
  
You should drink that, said a soft voice.  
  
Helen started awake.  
  
she snapped, then bit her lip against a groan as her head spun circles around her apparently melting brain.  
  
Remus was standing by her bedside, the curtains only pulled open a fraction. He looked inside at her with such a mixture of sadness, sympathy, and regret that she stared for a moment, and eventually tried to stammer, I -- I'm sorry, I didn't mean to --  
  
He smiled wearily. She saw that he was leaning heavily on the wall. Just drink the potion. You'll be much sorrier if you don't. He started levering himself away from the wall, but she stopped him with one outstretched hand. He looked down at his sleeve, which was caught in Helen's grasp, to her face, which looked at him pleadingly.  
  
Who are you? she gasped, trying to sit up.  
  
He frowned at her struggles, and put a hand on her shoulder, pushing her back down gently. Take it slowly, he said, sounding genuinely concerned. It hurts at first.  
  
Helen looked into his eyes, so full of pain. It seemed, to Helen, that it must never stop hurting.  
  
Whatever _it'_ was.  
  
She tried and failed to lever herself into a sitting position. She was just getting her fingers wedged against the matress to try again when she felt Remus' hands slide under her arms, as if she were a child he was going to try and lift. With the combined push and pull, Helen managed to finally sit up without too much trouble.  
  
Remus leaned back against the wall, ashen-faced and breathing hard. Poppy's going to kill me, he muttered.  
  
Helen couldn't manage a smile, though she knew exactly what Remus was thinking -- the nurse was so incredibly determined to make people heal, whether they wanted to or not, and doing such heavy lifting wasn't helping Remus' condition any.  
  
After a moment Remus caught his breath back, and leaned back towards Helen's bed, sideways. Please drink it, he said, and Helen couldn't help but nod, her eyes captivated by the look in his soft brown ones. She picked up the goblet, hesitated, glanced surreptitiously at the odd man once again.  
  
Hold your breath, he advised wisely.  
  
She did so. Pinching her nose tightly, Helen downed the whole potion in two gulps. Thunking the goblet back onto the bedside table, she spluttered as the very last of it slid away down her esophagus, leaving a nasty residual flavor in her mouth. What with that potion on top of neglecting to brush her teeth for two days, she was afraid she probably had record-breaking bad breath.  
  
Her breath, of course, didn't concern her so much at the moment as did Remus, who was still standing there, watching her. She coughed once or twice, and swallowed, but the horrible taste wouldn't go away; so, finally, she looked back up at him.  
  
She realized that this was her first time to see his face perfectly clearly, clean of blood and rain, close-up and well-lit. His hair was almost exactly the same shade of brown as hers, if perhaps a bit lighter; but his was flecked through with a heavy peppering of gray. There were two distinct sets of lines on his face -- a face that had far too many lines, as a matter of fact, for a man who seemed relatively young. One set was faint, unused at the moment; lines clearly indicating bright smiles, laughter, a generally cheerful and agreeable person. Allan had never had any lines like that, Helen realized vaguely.  
  
The second set was currently in use, however -- shadow-darkened furrows on his brow, the smallest of all tics in the corner of his mouth, circles under his eyes rather than crows' feet crinkling the edges of them. Here was a man who had taken more than his fair burden of life and all its complications, and had, so far, managed to survive it without losing a sense of humor -- while at the same time aging prematurely, probably in both mind and body. Helen felt strangely sympathetic for him, her fear abating slightly.  
  
Who are you? she asked more gently.  
  
Remus looked away. Remus J. Lupin, professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, he recited, blinking defiantly at the far wall.  
  
Not that, said Helen, though she was intruiged by the notion that he was a professor.   
  
What am I? Remus finished for her, bitterly. Of course, I'm a what, not a who. Everyone goes straight for that, don't they. Nothing but a monster. He refused to look at her. Helen was rather taken aback by his tone.  
  
Well, then, he said, slumping quickly out of his brief state of anger -- he didn't really seem like someone who could stay vengeful for very long. What I am. I'm a wolf in sheep's clothing. Can't touch silver, have a rather large lunar connection, the curse transfers through bites. Your guess.  
  
Helen stared, her heart sinking. A werewolf, she whispered. And you -- you bit--  
  
I bit you, he said softly.  
  
Helen sank back onto her pillows, trying to grasp the extremity of the situation and failing.  
  
I'm sorry, said Remus.  
  
It's all right, replied Helen automatically, responding to genuine feeling with cold protocol, as she often did.  
  
You should rest, said Remus suddenly, his voice very soft and quiet indeed -- Helen almost didn't hear him. Then, without any resistance on her part, he pushed himself off the wall and pulled her curtains all the way shut. She could hear him as he limped heavily to a spot somewhere across the room.  
  
No, I didn't mean... she began desperately, but she didn't think he could hear her. She wanted to apologize -- _it's all right'_ wasn't what she had meant to say at all --  
  
Of course it wasn't all right. It was all wrong. It would always be wrong -- it probably always had been wrong for Remus, and it's all right' was just the kind of stupid thing people said to him who really, really didn't understand what he lived with. Helen couldn't believe she had just said something so dumb and unfeeling -- she _should_ understand it better than other people; she _should_ have been able to get it right.  
  
She burrowed back under her covers and, more miserable than ever, let the white filter take over her mind.  
  
-------------  
_See the world in green and blue  
See China right in front of you  
See the canyons broken by cloud  
See the tuna fleets clearing the sea out  
See the Bedouin fires at night  
See the oil fields at first light and  
See the bird with a leaf in her mouth  
After the flood all the colors came out  
  
Touch me, take me to that other place  
Reach me, I know I'm not a hopeless case  
  
What you don't have you don't need it now  
What you don't know you can feel it somehow  
What you don't have you don't need it now  
Don't need it now  
  
Beautiful day..._  
-- Beautiful Day' by U2  
-------------  
  
A/N: The lyrics of Beautiful Day' are mixed up somewhat, but out it down to artistic license. The song is on U2's newest (as far as I know) album, _All That You Can't Leave Behind._ Do you like it so far? Drop a review! Next chapter isn't finished yet, but a huge chunk in sixth chapter is done. I have erratic thought processes. I'll post against as soon as possible! (Remus: And that'll be what, next year?) *hissing whisper* Shut up, they'll hear you!


	4. One Soft Sweet Song

REPLIES TO REVIEWERS (this only applies to people who reviewed chpt. 3)  
  
Saerry Snape: Thankies! Hope you get your comp back soon and update, cause I really want to read the revised version of chapter 98473 or whatever it's up to now in NM. ;p Kidding. 94? Anyway, the second task. Blah. I can't think right now. Maybe I should shut up...  
  
The Marauder's Map: Heh, like the name (it's my favorite prop from HP). Give Remey happiness? What nonsense is this? *laughs uproariously* Okay, sorry, couldn't resist -- no offense. Anyway, I'm with you -- Reme is outranked only by Sirius (*huggles Siri*) as my favorite HP character. I express my love through torture, apparently. Personally I am of the opinion that my muses are all homicidal psychos posing as innocent little angels *snort* -- but maybe it's just me. To the point: there WILL be Remus torture, and lots of it (but not as much Remus as Helen-torture)... and with the climax I've got in mind, there are two possible outcomes. One is bittersweet, the other is depressing, like a Shakespeare tragedy or a bad 70's movie, where everyone dies at the end. I'll probably write both endings, pick the best one for the main story, and post the other as an alternate. As for Helen having magic or not -- well, first: werewolves are inherently magical. Second: NO, she cannot to silly wand-waving types of magic, as Snape so eloquently put it. She's NOT a witch, she's still a Muggle -- but she's also a werewolf. You'll see what sort of magic she has later on... just don't be looking for anything big and flashy, cause it's a lot more subtle than that. There will be an ongoing dream that will be very important, I can say that much.  
  
Eeek eek, I'll try not to ramble so much to anyone else...  
  
Waterfall: Thanks! Once Helen started forming in my head, I just had to write the story. I like the girl a lot, she's quite endearing after a while. *g* Oh, she'll find out what it's like all right -- not just the transformations, but also the Registry, the prejudice, the everyday problems... whoo, fun, character torture. *rubs hands in anticipation* Sorry, it's my little weirdness.  
  
Shorty: Thanks bunches, I'm so glad you like it!  
  
Hermione Weasley: Thanks for reading! I was going for a very different approach to a Remus romance, so I'm glad I succeeded. And... weird pagan shit? Well, I'm not exactly pagan or wiccan or anything, if that's what you think. The god in this story isn't pagan at all -- you'll find out who his is much later on. I can't leave it out, because it's basically the entire foundation of the plot. Thanks for the comment, though, and please keep reading!  
  
eliza: Glad Saerry's plug for my stuff worked so well. Carry on, stealing my erratic thought processes would probably be a blessing to everyone.... *g*  
  
-----------  
A/N: Nothing much to say, except to reiterate that my muses are evil and terribly indecisive. They suddenly told me they wanted to work on THIS story instead of Let Others Follow. Which is okay... just annoying. Anyway, enjoy!  
  
------------  
Chapter Four: One Soft Sweet Song  
-------------  
  
Helen spent four days in the hospital wing methodically distancing herself from the truth.  
  
She could not be a werewolf. And there were perfectly logical reasons _why_ she couldn't be a werewolf.  
  
One: Werewolves do not exist.  
  
The rest of the reasons were all irrelevant after #1, of course.  
  
Besides, she didn't _feel_ like a werewolf. Shouldn't something be... different? An extra presence in the back of her mind, sudden carnivorous urges, thicker eyebrows? Something? Anything?  
  
But no, everything seemed perfectly... _normal._ If anything, Helen felt better -- stronger -- than she had before.  
  
No. No. Everything was wrong. This wasn't how things were supposed to happen. She didn't understand her life anymore. It had never been easy, but it had never so complicated, either. She felt like she had been dropped into an advanced Literature course without ever having learned to read. Like being a band director and not knowing the tune... and everyone expected her to know it, but in truth she had no clue.  
  
Like... becoming a thing of inherent magic without even truly believing in magic itself.  
  
A Muggle werewolf. She was stuck in a world that revolved around the ability to perform spells, but she couldn't do so much as levitate a feather. From snips of overheard conversation in the Three Broomsticks, she had gathered that wizards scorned Muggles. _So,_ she wondered, _what do they think of werewolves?_ The only reason she didn't ask Poppy that very thing was because she couldn't find any way to phrase the question delicately.  
  
She caught only a few short glimpses of Remus during her four-day rest -- coming and going at all times, in and out of the hospital wing, apparently allowed more slack by Madam Pomfrey than he gave her credit for. He walked heavily on the left leg, and for the first day the pain was so severe he was forced to use a cane. The fourth and final day was the only time their eyes met -- the briefest of glances contained a myriad of expressions, a thought conveyed and an emotion hammered in.  
  
His eyes showed her pain, and they showed her regret. Apprehension was apparent in the premature lines on his young face. With a glance he told her that his sense of humor, his liveliness, his hope -- all were buried under the rubble of his life, crumbling down around him. And finally, finally, Helen was forced to face the fact: she was the cause, she was the missing link, she was the catalyst that had started the chain reaction that had led to the demise of a good man's career.  
  
Remus broke eye contact, and the feeling faded. But still, Helen didn't doubt the truth any longer.  
  
***  
_One more day down  
Everybody has those days  
Where one soft sweet song's  
Just enough to clear my head  
  
Fall on real life  
Is anybody left there sane?  
If we slide on over and accept fate  
Then it's bound to be a powerful thing  
_***  
  
Helen was almost dismayed when Poppy finally came to her later that day -- she suspected what the nurse was going to say, and she dreaded having to leave the routine of hospital life. She'd be thrown out of the one place where she could safely do nothing, thrown back into a world that was constantly in motion, where there was a life that she had to live.  
  
Can I go back to the inn? she asked rather hopelessly, once Poppy had told her of her relatively clean bill of health. It was clean all but for one thing, of course: Helen's fun, brand-shiny-new medical complication.  
  
_Lycanthropy,'_ read Poppy's chart; _transmitted by bite. Accidental occurrence due to the release of one Joseph Lupin from self-imposed restraint during transformation stage. No suspected premeditation of attack: waxing moon influential stage before transformation stage was normal. Transmitter: Registered lycanthrope Joseph Lupin, code name Remus, ID No. 98462; current employment: professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry; current employer: Albus Dumbledore. Receiver: Helen Corana Levine, a Muggle of indeterminate origin; currently unemployed. Unregistered as of 18 Jan., 2002 A.D.'_  
  
Poppy sighed at Helen's question, shaking her head. She took a seat by Helen's bed and began to speak, in a quiet, unassuming voice, a voice that was meant to cushion the blow of her words. Helen, honey, she began slowly, I expect you've already talked to Remus.  
  
A little.  
  
Then you'll know what happened. Poppy paused. It's hard to accept, I know. But you have to understand that there's procedure to go through with at the Ministry.  
  
Bureaucratic hoops to jump through.  
  
So to speak.  
  
Silence, for a long moment.  
  
What do I have to do? said Helen, empty and cold with the unfairness of it all.  
  
The DRCMC is separated into three divisions, you see, the Beast, Being, and Spirit Divisions. Werewolves are forever being shunted between Beast and Being. Right now there's a Werewolf Support Unit at the Being Division, but it doesn't receive much public support anymore, not with the Dark Lord using bound lycanthropes as... well, as weapons. The only office pertaining to werewolves that has ever remained very constant is the Registry. It's part of the Beast Division.  
  
A memory of conversation floated up in Helen's mind. You said Remus had to leave to deal with the Registry. At the inn, when I came here.  
  
Poppy nodded. Yes, you see now. I shouldn't have let that slip, whether I knew you were a Muggle or not. Betrayal of client confidentiality.  
  
The Registry is under constant pressure to catalogue all the werewolves currently alive in the wizarding world. They even have operatives who go undercover as Muggles to search out those werewolves who try to hide themselves in the Muggle community. The easiest and most painless way to deal with them is to just give up and cooperate. But Poppy's face was hard, and her expression told Helen that _she_ had never chosen the easy, painless way, and neither would any of her patients as long as she had anything to say about it.  
  
Helen nodded. After a moment she said, You said something about the DRCMC. What's...?  
  
Abbreviation for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures.  
  
_Is that all I am now? A creature who has to be controlled, who has to hand her entire identity over to a government office buried in a division labeled beast'?_  
  
Poppy cleared her throat and said, You'll stay here tonight, and tomorrow we'll head to London by Floo Network, seeing as you can't Apparate...  
  
A quiet voice interrupted the nurse's matter-of-fact speech. Let me take her, Poppy.  
  
Remus pushed the entrance door open all the way; he had been standing behind it for the last few minutes, listening through a crack. He leaned on the doorframe, arms crossed, his expression seeming to forbid any argument.  
  
Poppy Pomfrey stood up quickly. Remus, you know very well how much work there is to do here, and you yourself will have to go in a few days --  
  
All the more good reason, he said calmly, unperturbed. I live under these peoples' shadow, Poppy. I know them all too well. She needs someone who, no offense, who has more experience with that place.  
  
I know _that place'_ like the back of my hand --  
  
He interrupted her with a brief shake of his head. You know the system, he said; better than me, certainly. I can't count the times I've owled you about a change of process or a summons I didn't recognize. But you can't tell her which members of the board of directors can be... more easily persuaded. Or introduce her to half the others of our kind on this island, by both true and code names, with their personalities and histories all wrapped in. I know the _place,_ Poppy. He gestured vaguely. It just has a feel to it -- the way to do something or say something just so, to whatever end.... He sighed and dropped his hands. Maybe you have to be one of us.  
  
Poppy looked undecided for a moment; but then she caved, her mouth twitching into a smile. All right. You could always defeat my better sense. She sighed, the smile fading. She glanced from Helen to Remus, and the sadness in her gaze became more pronounced. No need to tell you to take care of her.  
  
Remus looked past Poppy to meet Helen's eyes once again. She found herself captivated by the soft brown color, by the pure emotion that he could capture in one look. he said softly, still looking at Helen. He unfolded his arms and stood up straight. No need.  
  
There was an brief silence -- it wasn't entirely comfortable, but it wasn't acutely awkward either. Helen found herself thinking how utterly ironic it was that the man who had caused this entire situation was now the only person she felt she could trust.  
  
No, but that wasn't true; _he_ hadn't caused the situation. It wasn't his fault he was a monst -- well, part animal, anyway. She was the one who had let him loose on herself... and somehow her responsibility went back even further than that, all the way back to the day a small town called McLeod had mysteriously morphed into an important wizarding community called Hogsmeade.  
  
Poppy finally broke the silence. Well... I suppose time's getting on, she said, clearing her throat. Minerva's called a staff meeting for this evening, after classes are over.  
  
Remus nodded absently, making a mental note. I'll be there.  
  
She wants Helen to come. Albus is going to be there.  
  
Remus' eyes snapped back to Poppy's. What's on the table, then? he asked sharply. I can't escape the firing squad no matter where I am?  
  
He regretted his words instantly, as Poppy flinched and pressed her lips into a thin line. I think, she said, too blandly, that it was intended more as a welcoming committee.  
  
I'm sorry, he muttered. I didn't mean that.  
  
she replied coolly, not quite willing to forgive him yet. I'll tell Minerva that you and Miss Levine will be there. Now, I've got work to do.  
  
The corner of Remus' mouth twitched as Poppy turned on her heel and left. Shouldn't have said that, he muttered under his breath. Should _not_ have said that. He began to turn back towards the door.  
  
Helen stopped him. Er -- wait. He turned back; but she had already forgotten what she was going to ask. She opened her mouth, lost. Um. Do you... that is, can I leave? The... the hospital wing? I kind of wanted to -- er -- see the castle. The word still sounded strange in her mouth. _Castle' = home... werewolf' = self... these connections just aren't clicking._  
  
Remus blinked. I don't see why not. He paused, then added, I'll give you the tour, if you'd like. I don't really have anything to do, not if Minerva and Timothy have been subbing for me all this time. I honestly think they _like_ grading papers.  
  
Helen gave him a small smile. Thanks. I'll get dressed -- er... where're my robes, anyway?  
  
Remus quickly located the pull-out bottom part of the hospital beds for her, where clothes and belongings of the patients' were kept during long stays. He waited for her in the hall; and when she came out, fully dressed and with hair as presentable as she could get it on short notice, he smiled at her. A real smile, too; honest. She found herself liking his smile immensely.  
  
Amends, then, had been made for her slip-up that had abruptly ended their last conversation. She wasn't sure when and how the point of forgiveness had been reached -- it could be that he pitied her, and thought that her own self-repentance was enough; but somehow that explanation didn't sit right with Helen, and she dismissed it. Maybe... maybe he was truly concerned for her. Maybe he really wanted to help. The feeling was new to Helen, to have a true friend...  
  
More than a friend. They shared the bonds of blood and magic, enacted through ritual -- the ritual of the bite. Trust, if anything, could be the _only_ foundation of a possible relationship. Nothing about the partnership was casual, nor could it ever be.  
  
It never occurred to Helen to love Remus, not the way she had loved' Allan or Lewis or the others. She only wanted to be with him, near him. He was her salvation, her creator, her destroyer, and her curse... but never, not once, did it occur to her to love him in any way. She only wanted to trust him.  
  
She wanted, very badly, to _trust_ him.  
  
She returned his smile, and he began the tour of Hogwarts.  
  
---------  
_If it's just that you're weak  
Can we talk about it  
It's getting so damn creepy  
Just nursing this ghost of a chance  
The fiction, the romance  
And the Technicolor dreams  
Of black and white people  
_-----------  
  
The Great Hall was more magnificent than anything Helen had ever seen. The spires of perfectly shaped stone curved up towards the shadows of the ceiling, fire-lit by the dying light of late afternoon. The ceiling itself was indescribable -- like the most beautiful painting ever, but so much more _real..._  
  
Michelangelo's just rolling in his grave, she breathed, craning her neck up to catch the full vista.  
  
Remus blinked, taken aback for a moment; but then, as if startled into it, he laughed... an honest laugh. She grinned, glancing at him. He had a nice laugh.  
  
Well, then, he said, catching his breath. That's about it.  
  
But it's so much bigger... you know, than what you've shown me. Isn't it?  
  
Mm. I only gave you the ten cent tour. It really is an enormous place. I didn't want it too seem too overbearing.  
  
She nodded. He'd shown her the main halls on each level, the staff, guest, and student residences; and now this, the grand finale -- the Great Hall.  
  
He hesitated for a moment, and said slowly, as if he were breaking some rule, Er... there is one map that's ever been made of this castle.  
  
She looked at him, mildly surprised. I thought you said the doors and stairways changed too much -- and all the renovations --  
  
Only one, he repeated. Three copies of it were made, and one of those was destroyed. One of the students has one copy... and I know where I can find the other, though it may require some excavation.  
  
She blinked. __  
  
Remus shifted. I hid it in one of the hidden passages under the castle. But the passage caved in a few years ago... I'd have to see the extent of the damage before I could make a call on whether I could uncover it.  
  
Why so much secrecy about the map? she asked, honestly curious.  
  
Remus glanced around the hall, as if afraid someone might be listening. He led Helen back to the door to one of the smaller stairwells leading out of the Great Hall. I helped make the map, he said in a low voice. And never you dare tell anyone else that I'm telling you this -- Dumbledore and some others of the staff know already, but it's supposed to be between us few only.  
  
Helen nodded, intrigued and a little nervous.  
  
It's not life-threatening information, he reassured her, seeing her expression. Not within the castle, anyway. Never let on to anyone outside Hogwarts about _any_ of this, understand?  
  
She nodded, but stopped him before he could speak again. If it's so secure, why are you telling me?  
  
He hesitated, looking long and hard into her eyes. I trust you, he said finally. And... it seems right. He drew a soft breath between his teeth, let his eyes go unfocused. I don't know why it's right. He shook his head. I honestly don't. But... I do trust you, maybe more than I should.  
  
She stared. What God was there, that could curse her with a living hell all her own, and then send her this wolf in sheep's clothing -- or maybe sheep in wolf's clothing -- who was the answer to all her dreams?  
  
Trust -- so soon? she said, and she wasn't sure where her words were coming from.  
  
It's only what you deserve, after what I put you through.  
  
Her lips spread into a slow, maniac grin. The laughter gurgled up from some deep place in her past -- hysterical, half-choked giggles; breathless, gasping laughter. Her side was soon sore with it. Remus, standing there hardly four feet away from her, had no idea what to make of it. He looked at her uncertainly -- concerned for her sanity, maybe.  
  
I'm -- I'm sorry -- she gasped, choking herself to a halt. The corners of her eyes were leaking unnoticed tears. It's just... she coughed once or twice, tried to regain her composure; just... that... *ahem* She wiped her eyes. What _you_ put me through. She shook her head, avoiding Remus' eyes. _You._ Werewolf. Biting me. That's _nothing._ You should've seen where I _came_ from...  
  
He touched her shoulder awkwardly, and she quieted. She shook her head. I'm sorry, she said softly. Go on... you were saying something about a map.  
  
Remus mouthed soundlessly for a second before regaining the thread of his story. Well, the -- er -- yes, the map. We called it the Marauder's Map, actually, the four of us who created it. He allowed himself a small grin and added, The names of the four Marauders were dreaded by every staff and faculty member in the entire school, back then... we were horrible troublemakers; I really can't believe I did some of the things I did when I was a child.  
  
Helen, absorbing this new piece of information, gave Remus yet another good look-over -- and found the entire concept of him as a juvenile delinquent to be absolutely ludicrous. She raised an eyebrow skeptically.  
  
He grinned. Hard to believe it now. But I was one of the four -- along with James Potter, Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew.  
  
She shook her head. Should I know those names? I don't think I've heard of anyone... But then a thought struck, a memory from years ago -- or was it only a few days? She _had_ heard the name Potter before, flurrying through the chinks of the crowd at the Three Broomsticks. A little whisper of a name; but it had always seemed to have some great meaning that Helen knew nothing of.  
  
Potter -- I heard that at the pub in Hogsmeade. A lot of people, always talking about... er... some H' name? Harvey? Harold?  
  
Remus nodded gravely. Harry. Harry Potter -- James Potter's son. It's a long and complicated puzzle of events... Do you know Harry's story yet? Poppy might have told you.  
  
Helen shook her head.  
  
This is going to take a while, he sighed.  
  
-----------  
_One boy head strong  
Thinks that living here's just plain  
He's pushed down so hard  
You can hear him start to sink  
  
And it's one last round of petty conversation  
You hold on boy cause  
You won't go down like this  
Just roll on over  
Lay down till it's more than you can take  
_-----------  
  
Helen's new suite of guest rooms was, in her opinion, far too large and disproportionately tall. Helen liked a nice cozy room to curl up in, and the eighteen-foot-high stone walls did not achieve any such effect.  
  
She coped as best she could that first night with what she had, though she made a mental note to see Poppy about some changes to the decor. She had plenty to think about, which took her mind off of her surroundings -- and off of the disturbing thought of her imminent Registration, to which she was not looking forward at all. It had taken Remus nearly three hours to tell her the complete, unabridged history of the wizarding world, and of Harry Potter in particular. Helen knew he had glossed over some of the tales of his school days, but she didn't blame him -- they both had things in their personal pasts that weren't ready to face the daylight yet. The thought of Allan made Helen shiver... thought the reflex might also have had something to do with the cold draft coming in through a small crack in the window.  
  
Helen glanced up towards the ceiling, and was once again dizzied and disconcerted by the sheer height of the walls. Tearing her eyes quickly away from the shadowed rafters, she looked instead on the carpet and fireplace with grim determination. At the moment she was sitting curled up in a deep, overstuffed armchair next to the low-burning fire, wrapped in a quilt that she had found in the linen closet in the bathroom. It was like having an entire house to herself... for Hogwarts was indeed huge enough to hold several dozen mansions, and each member of the staff had a sizable chunk of the building to themselves.  
  
The remains of her dinner sat on the low coffee table in front of her -- she had not felt up to eating at the giant table in the dining room two rooms over. One wondered why a suite of guest rooms should even _have_ a dining table big enough for a party of twenty or more...  
  
She had taken her supper an hour or so before the dinner bell rang throughout the halls, calling all the regular students to the Great Hall for their meal. Now, tired as she was, Helen was determined to stay awake until the students' dinner was over, so she would still have enough energy left to make it to the staff room for the welcoming committee' of teachers and staff (as Poppy had put it).  
  
But as she sat and mulled over Remus' story, allowing the decidedly excellent school food to settle in her stomach, she found that it was harder and harder to keep her eyelids open...  
  
***  
_The end of days  
Is many ways  
And love's the softest one  
  
But hurt will burn  
And child will learn  
That pain's the greatest done  
  
**...daughter...'**  
  
the little girl was giggling, so soft you could hardly hear her, her head bent down intent on her task  
  
and as you passed around her you could see her with the shiny little silver toy, cutting the pretty pictures into her flesh  
  
**...my own...'**  
  
an older boy with brown hair and dark red hands is helping the wide-eyed, glassy-eyed, empty-eyed bird... the poor owl that can't stand on its own... and the boy is helping it stand on its perch --  
  
the hammer fell again  
the nail drove further in  
and in the end, the good man knows  
darkness swallows sin  
  
**...come back to me...'**_****  
***  
  
Helen screamed, nearly falling out of her chair. Her sweaty hands were clenched around the quilt, and she gasped with horror and fear... she'd had nightmares before, but nothing like this, nothing so real, so vivid...  
  
Miss? Miss!  
  
A small, childlike voice was crying out from somewhere above her head, sounding alarmed. Helen's head snapped up, and she looked around frantically for the source of the voice, her nerves still frazzled by the terrible dream.  
  
Who's there? she called, perhaps a bit louder than was necessary.  
  
Are you all right, miss? said the tinny voice. You was mumblin' and stuff, and then you's shouted, and I was afraid for you'd had a bad dream...  
  
At long last, Helen's eyes came to rest on the source of the voice -- and she froze in her tracks, mouth open, staring. She must have been too preoccupied earlier to look much at the paintings in the castle, or Remus must have forgotten to tell her about them, or something; but for whatever reason, she had certainly not expected to see a little girl with a very sincere expression looking wide-eyed at her out of a carved wooden frame hanging above her mantelpiece.  
  
Who... who are you? Helen gasped, trying and failing to recover her composure.  
  
And I know what bad dreams is like, I has em sometimes, and Sister Robena telled me that they're not really so bad when you wake up -- is it so bad now? -- I hope you's okay, you scared me bad when you shouted --  
  
Hang on, said Helen, interrupting the child's constant stream of talk. Helen took a deep breath. Er -- now, who are you? Should I know you? _Ye gods, I'm talking to a painting..._  
  
My name's Ana, said the little girl, grinning a somewhat snaggle-toothed grin. She didn't look older than six, and her black hair was more than a little unruly -- tangled and frizzy, with one or two twigs and leaves stuck in for good measure. She was wearing a frock that looked like it might have been new and quite nice-looking before she had gone climbing trees and hiding under bushes in it. It's for Anastasia, she went on, struggling a bit with her full name. Sister Robena said my daddy had me painted of his own daughter. My daddy was a Headmaster, she added proudly. Youngest ever. Sister Robena tolds me.  
  
Helen dredged up the Headmaster's name after a minute of hard remembering, and asked, confused, Who, Dumbledore? He's not young at all, I saw some pictures --  
  
Ana laughed uproariously. Not Mr. Dumbledore, miss! she giggled. My daddy was Garath Mallory. He hasn't been Headmaster for ever and ever! Ana's face darkened a bit. I haven't seen my daddy for ever and ever either, she added sadly. Sister Robena said he had to go on a trip someplace, but he never comed back. I miss him.  
  
Realization dawned on Helen. Your father had you painted as a portrait of his own daughter... years and years ago... and you've never aged? she asked incredulously.  
  
I'm not little! said Ana defensively, her little face with its smears of dust and grass-stains softening into a ferocious, pouty-lipped argumentative expression. I'm almost seven!  
  
But -- er, Ana -- how long have you been almost seven? Helen asked delicately.  
  
Ana shrugged. Dunno. A while, I guess. I don't remember anytime before being six.  
_  
She'll never age,_ thought Helen, shocked and a bit appalled. _Isn't that cruel, to create a child who can't age? She'll never get a mental capacity for anything above a six-year-old's intelligence... and she'll never have proper parents..._  
  
Who's Sister Robena? asked Helen, suddenly finding herself interested in the welfare of this young painting. Does she take care of you?  
  
replied Ana, grinning widely. Sister Robena belongs to the order of nuns in the mural on the fourth floor side hall. She's like my mommy, only not really -- I never knew my real mommy, but Sister Robena says she was real nice.  
  
Helen felt a pang of pity, and was about to change the subject when she happened to glance sidelong at the clock. Dinner would be over by now for certain, and the staff was probably already waiting for her in the lounge...  
  
Oh, Ana, I'm sorry, said Helen, her train of thought suddenly thrown off track. I have to go -- will you be here when I get back? I'd love to talk to you again...  
  
Ana laughed again. I live here, miss silly. I'll be here forever.  
  
Helen was taken aback by the comment, but didn't let it show. I'll be back in a while, then, she said, grabbing her cloak off the back of the armchair and heading for the door.  
  
Miss --  
  
What, Ana?  
  
What's your name?  
  
Helen couldn't resist a smile. Helen, hon, she replied, not really knowing where the hon' had come from. My name's Helen.  
  
'Bye, Auntie Helen...  
  
But Helen had already gone out the door, and didn't hear her new title.  
  
---------  
_So one more day down  
And everybody's changin'  
One more head down  
Just enough to reach my head  
  
Yeah if you're weak  
Can we talk about it  
It's getting so damn creepy  
Just nursing this ghost of a chance  
The fiction, the romance  
And the Technicolor dreams  
Of black and white people  
  
We are black and white people  
--------------  
_  
A/N: The song was Black & White People' by matchbox TWENTY, and is on the album Mad Season. The poetry in the dream is mine -- MINE, I TELL YOU!! *ahem* Don't know where THAT came from.... There will be more such nightmares in later chapters, and will all contain disturbing themes and images, so count yourself fairly warned. The little girl cutting the pretty pictures into her flesh was swiped from issue #... I think it was #5 or close... of the first arc of The Sandman, Preludes and Nocturnes. Read Sandman, it's sooo awesome. Written by Neil Gaiman, one of the coolest writers ever. (Why are all my favorite writers British, anyway?)  
  
Next chpt will probably be very short, as it will consist almost entirely of the welcoming committee. After that, guess what? -- we get to see.... *duh duh duhnnn*.... The Registry. Okay, cheesy dramatic music done now; time to go to bed. I'm about falling asleep on the spot. G'night.


End file.
